Author: Djudy
Date: 2021-11-06 03:37
I was fortunate to be able to acquire a lovely used recent Selmer alto clarinet a while back and really love playing it, I find it a very 'zen' instrument. So I asked if I could switch to alto in our local wind band as there are already a bunch of Bb clarinets and the clarinet choir, that would have been the more logical place to play it, has disappeared what with all the problems during succesive Covid 19 lockdowns.
About half the repertoire for this year has a 'official' part for the Alto and where one is lacking I play 3rd clarinet transposed. This brings up the question of where do I sit ?
When I study the conductor's full score I often find the Alto part is more similar to the Bass Clarinet, the Tenor and Bary Saxophones and occasionally the Euphonium or Trombone. In our setup, most of those instruments are in back of me; I'm in the 3rd row with Clarinets to the right and Alto Sax to my left (facing the conductor). While this works for the transposed 3rd Cl parts, I feel out of place with most of the Alto parts (but not all) since the other similar parts are in the back. The director hasn't remarked on this so he must find it sounds ok but sometimes I do feel a bit unbalanced. I enjoy playing the Alto and want to make a good contribution. Anyone ever had a similar experience? Where does the Alto usually sit in a wind band? My old clarinet teacher who might have been able to help with this has moved, to my great regret, and I've lost track of him.
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The Clarinet BBoard
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